The terms “multi-channel audio” or “surround sound” generally refer to systems that can produce sounds that appear to originate from multiple directions around a listener. With the recent proliferation of computer games and game consoles, such as the Microsoft® X-Box®, the PlayStation®3 and the various Nintendo®-type systems, combined with at least one game designer's goal of “complete immersion” in the game, there exists a need for audio systems and methods that can assist the “immersion” by encoding three dimensional (3-D) spatial information in a multi-channel audio recording. The conventional and commercially available systems and techniques including Dolby Digital, DTS, and Sony Dynamic Digital Sound (SDDS) may be used to reproduce sound in the horizontal plane (azimuth), but such conventional systems may not adequately reproduce sound effects in elevation to recreate the experience of sounds coming from overhead or under-foot. Therefore, a need exists for systems and methods to record multi-dimensional audio, decode, process and accurately reproduce 3-D sounds for a listening environment and for use with gaming consoles or other sources of visual information.